Duncan Sheppard
Senior Advisor, Resilience
Insurance Council of Australia
Duncan is an experienced advocacy, communications and government relations professional with extensive experience in both the public and private sectors. His current role is Senior Advisor, Resilience at the Insurance Council of Australia which is the peak industry body for the general insurance industry. Prior to this he was Senior Policy and Communications Advisor at the Civil Contractors Federation, and has also held senior advocacy roles with the Australasian Railways Association and the Australian Logistics Council. His government background spans both federal and local governments. In the role of Senior Advisor, Resilience, Duncan drives the ICA’s advocacy agenda for improved resilience in the built environment, with a focus on improving Australia’s building codes and standards, investing in household and large-scale resilience measures and improved land-use planning arrangements - ultimately helping to maintain an insurable Australia.
Building Australia’s Resilience
There is a growing need to strengthen the resilience of Australia’s built environment to combat the effects of extreme weather events in Australia, including bushfires, cyclones and floods. The Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) is advocating for a greater consideration of climate risk by all levels government, and for them work closely with industry to implement measures that improve the resilience of both existing and future homes and buildings. These measures include allocating funding to infrastructure investment measures to strengthen resilience, improved land use planning, enhanced construction codes and standards and more robust building competence and compliance provisions. Duncan Sheppard, ICA’s Senior Advisor Resilience, will discuss some of these measures, and the role ICA is playing through research and analysis to advocate for action in these areas to help address the insurance protection gap in Australia.